Loose In The Wires

IGMS_Issue1Description

Boy falls in love. Boy gets dumped. Boy brings back two African gods from Botswana to heal girlfriend’s fickle nature and arthritis . . .

Read it here, Listen to it on Far Fetched Fables

Publication

  • Originally published in Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, Vol. 1, 2005
  • Audio production on Far Fetched Fables #44, 2015

Background

It all started with one sentence.

I was generating ideas, brainstorming, and out popped this line: “Bill had two African gods in a Smucker’s jelly jar in his trunk.”

That was the trunk of his car. And these were, of course, live gods. But what would fit in a Smucker’s jelly jar? How did they get there? What would they do? And what was going to happen with Bill?

I loved the sound of that line, the image, the situation, but one snippet of an idea is not enough to build a story. I toyed around with the idea now and again. And then years later I was listening to O is for Outlaw by Sue Grafton. The voice of one of the characters was exactly what I needed. He was all hick. And as soon as I decided that’s what my character would be, the story began to hum with electricity. Very soon after that, I finished it.

Orson Card published it in the debut issue of Intergalatic Medicine Show.

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